Portico Quartet
Portico Quartet
Discography
Knee Deep In The North Sea
Order the CD online by clicking here
Available as high quality MP3 download here
SHORTLISTED FOR THE NATIONWIDE MERCURY MUSIC PRIZE 2008.
See the launch announcement here
“The darlings of the jazz/leftfield jazz scene” Big Chill website"Sound like nothing you've ever heard” Time Out
“A phenomenon in the making” The Independent
Portico Quartet are four young musicians from South London. Living and playing together they describe their ethos as like an Indie band that plays post-jazz, and their unique sound has won them fans from Gilles Peterson to Radio 4 and Notion to BBC Music Magazine . Knee-Deep was Time Out's Jazz, Folk and World music album of the year for 2007 and is a Mercury Music Prize album of the year for 2008.
Portico Quartet are Jack Wylie (soprano Saxophone), Milo Fitzpatrick (double bass), Nick Mulvey (Hang and percussion) and Duncan Bellamy (drums and Hang) , and it's the mix of ethereal saxophone, flying saucer like Hang (imagine an otherworldly steel drum), clattering drums and earthy double-bass that gives their music it's inimitable, beautiful sound.
It was the chance purchase of the Hang by Duncan Bellamy, at a music festival, that inspired these young friends to start a band, and while their largely intuitive music references jazz and African music it's the Hang inspired trance-like repetitive patterns of Duncan and Nick Mulvey that propel the band into stranger pastures: invoking Philip Glass and Steve Reich's gamelan inspired minimalism.
Their dance friendly, melodic brand of hook-heavy post-jazz was honed busking across Europe and playing in unusual spaces; churches, galleries and chill-out zones. A weekly session at the South Bank and residency at the Brixton Ritzy earned them a cult following and inspired London 's hippest jazz club, the Vortex , to start a label to release their music. Sessions on XFM and Radio 1 followed and a storming set at the Glastonbury Festival had Q hailing their ‘ danceable chamber jazz soundscapes' that ‘ should make them a Glasto fixture '. Further performances that year include the Big Chill , Shoreditch , Brecon and London Jazz Festivals and the band return to the Vortex jazz club on August 27 th .
Selected by John Fordham (Guardian) as the ones to watch for in 2008
(Jazzwise, Dec 2007)
Cover of Jazz UK magazine in December 2007
(read the full feature here)
Interview from Londonist talking about their favourite record shop and so on here
Other nice interviews include one for Big Chill, where they are playing at this year's festival. Click here.
Review from Independent.
Chris Parker review
Live review from the Guardian hereCheck out Portico Quartet videos here.
Film by Sian Lattimer
PRESS QUOTES
“A phenomenon in the making” The Independent
‘ As traditionally hook based as anything from rock, to hip hop” The Guardian
"This unforgettable disc shimmers with brilliance." BBC Music Magazine
“Haunting, beautifully austere sound” Metro
“Danceable chamber jazz soundscapes combine hectic soprano sax riffing over a dynamic rhythm section and should make them a Glasto fixture' “‘best of the rest” Q Glastonbury Review 2008
“Strange but beautiful stuff” Notion
“Hummable melodies” the Sun
"Floating somewhere between jazz and modern classical music, this young group make a strikingly original sound." The Times
"The group generates pieces with a recognisably human pulse – ECM with a little extra passion, if you will..chamber jazz with a Late Junction twist" Sunday Times
“Their hook-based, jaunty, yet subtly layered music is tailor-made to find friends everywhere. ”The Guardian
‘Fresh, fun and different…an ear for a highly quotable melody” jazzwise
" Great stuff,... a cross between jazz and modern classical. It's mellifluous, exuberant and jaunty, full of catchy tunes and strong hooks" Allaboutjazz
"A band who make experimental and adventurous music sound wonderfully accessible, Portico Quartet are like nothing you've heard before." Straight No Chaser
Live dates
Sunday June 29 th Glastonbury (Jazz World Stage)
Wednesday July 9th Barbican Centre (supporting Maria Schneider)
Sunday July 20 th Koko, Camden – Itunes festival (supporting Neil Cowley)
Wednesday July 30 th - Roughtrade East, E1 (instore)
Friday August 1 st - Big Chill festival
Saturday August 9 th -Brecon Jazz Festival (Guildhall)
Saturday August 16 th - Shoreditch festival
Sunday August 17 th Eastbeach café – Littehampton
Wednesday August 27 th Vortex Jazz Club, Dalston
Wednesday Nov 19 th South Bank Centre – London Jazz Festival (with Gamelan master Supanggah)
for further information please contact kerstan ph: 077756555573
email: kerstanmac@gmail.com
www.riotmanagement.co.uk
